Yea idk if the full asking price is worth it but I will be finding that out soon enough. I don't really like to judge a book by its cover all the time, especially these days when so many AAA games shat the bed but I think I would have paid $40 USD for it instead of waiting until it's now $23.99 USD. Apparently it takes 30 or so hours to beat so certainly getting value in that sense.

Itshappening :o

I got a new phone recently with a newer AMOLED screen with high refresh rate and this news its a hell yes! Those screens get insanely bright (as screens go never mind for an OLED) and so smooth. For this, I'd expect this to do the same with ever better color reproduction. The issue with current large OLEDs is their limited brightness which affects HDR, especially if you use it in a well rooms. Man, UW gaming with pure blacks sure does excite the hell outta me!

The Monday news:

SALES /PLAYER COUNT & DEALS

Farming Simulator is wildly popular, in case you'd forgotten
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/farming-simulator-is-wildly-popular-in-case-youd-forgotten/
With Farming Simulator 22 out of the gates this past week, now's as good a time as ever to remind you that it's a wildly popular game series with a huge player count. Its average players have grown steadily since launch, and peak concurrent player counts have averaged over 90,000 people. It's the kind of good stats tracking we at PC Gamer thank SteamDB daily for.
Farming Simulator had a higher peak concurrent player count than Battlefield 2042 on Steam, and while Battlefield's average player count has declined steadily, Farming Simulator's has grown. That's definitely two very different player bases, but it's worth pointing out as a comparison of popularity. Today, November 28th, FS22 has broken an average player count of 60,000 on Steam, comparable to games like Grand Theft Auto V and Football Manager 2022.

GOG starts the week with 6 new sales:

• There are three Flash Deal, all of tem offering a 80% discount during the next 46 hours. The titles are the three Banner Saga games: The Banner Saga, The Banner Saga 2 and The Banner Saga 3.
• There's a Bethesda Sale that brings up to 80% discounts for the next 22 hours: https://www.gog.com/promo/20211125_bethesda_black_friday
• The new Weekly Sale comes with a mix of games up to 80% off: https://www.gog.com/promo/20211129_weekly_sale
• And Plug In Digital also puts its games on sale during the next week with up to 85% discounts: https://www.gog.com/promo/20211129_pid_sale

The guys at Humble have three new sales:

• There's a new Humble Bundle: the Akupara 5 year Anniversary Bundle, with up to 14 games to get during the next 11 days: https://www.humblebundle.com/games/akupara-5-year-anniversary-bundle
• The Humble Store still runs its Black Friday Sale, sorry, Cyber Monday Sale. Be aware that some of the deals end tomorrow while others will last another 5 days.

Fanatical also celebrates Cyber Monday with several new deals:

• There are 20 Flash Deals that will end in 24 hours. Check them out
• The first of the three new bundles (well, only one is actually new) is the BYO Anime Bundle 3, with 22 games to choose your 2, 3, 6 or 10 games bundle for the next 19 days: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-anime-bundle-3
• The BYO Elite VR Bundle features 20 games to build your 3, 5, 7 or 10 games bundle: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-elite-vr-bundle
• And the newly released BYO Holiday Bundle brings 24 games to choose for your 2, 5 or 10 games bundle: https://www.fanatical.com/en/pick-and-mix/build-your-own-holiday-bundle

SOFTWARE & DRIVERS

Steam sets new record with over 27 million concurrent players
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/steam-sets-new-record-with-over-27-million-concurrent-players/
Steam has just set a new record for its concurrent players. As SteamData indicates, there were over 27 million concurrent players on November 27th.
Steam’s previous record (26 million concurrent players) was set back in February 2021. My guess is that Steam’s Autumn Sale is the event that allowed Valve’s platform to set this new record.

MODS, EMULATORS & FAN PROJECTS

Green-fingered Minecraft modder makes all the plants look nicer
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/green-fingered-minecraft-modder-makes-all-the-plants-look-nicer/
Minecraft's aesthetic is always an interesting topic: Simplistic and rudimentary in some ways, arguably even ugly at points, yet capable of producing some of the greatest visual spectacles in gaming. Oft-imitated but never bettered, the flexibility of its style can be almost impressionistic at times, its rudimentary shapes building into truly evocative landscapes.
The plants can look a bit crap though. The Minecraft modder Dark Storm clearly thinks along similar lines, as they've been working on a newly released pack called the Nature Revamp, which as the name suggests focuses on making all of the world's plant life and fungi a little bit nicer.
>> The mod, for the Java Edition, can be downloaded from here.

This mod lets you treat Skyrim Anniversary Edition like a pick-and-choose buffet
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/this-mod-lets-you-treat-skyrim-anniversary-edition-like-a-pick-and-choose-buffet/
Skyrim Anniversary Edition is Bethesda's most recent re-packaging of its all-conquering fantasy RPG, and a pretty good one at that: it includes the Skyrim Special Edition and bundles in all of the previously released premium Creation Club additions (here's a full explainer). And there's fishing.
Creation Club mods? What if I don't want them? Such ran the thoughts of Darkfox 127, who has created the Skyrim Anniversary Edition Content Picker. This mod will help keep your Data folder organised and pick-and-choose the content you want to install from the Anniversary Edition.

Revenge of the Squidlike: You can now play Squid Game in CS:GO too
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/revenge-of-the-squidlike-you-can-now-play-squid-game-in-csgo-too/
Squid Game is a Netflix-produced Korean drama that has achieved absolutely ludicrous success since its release in September 2021. (...)
Somewhere, a single finger on a cursed monkey's paw curled, and we can now play Squid Game in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. User Ansimist and a small team developed the project, which features all of the big hits from the show, including a rendition of my old nemesis, Red Light, Green Light.

GAMING NEWS

Bioshock 4 may be called Bioshock Isolation, may use Unreal Engine 5, may have two cities
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/bioshock-4-may-be-called-bioshock-isolation-may-use-unreal-engine-5-may-have-two-cities/
It appears that some new rumors for the next BioShock game, BioShock 4, have just surfaced online. According to these new rumors, BioShock 4 will be called BioShock Isolation, will be using Unreal Engine 5, and will be announced in Q1 2022.
>> That's a lot of "mays".

Eyeballistic will repitch Mortal Kombat Trilogy HD Remakes to Warner Bros + New Exclusive Screenshots
https://www.dsogaming.com/news/eyeballistic-will-repitch-mortal-kombat-trilogy-hd-remakes-to-warner-bros-new-exclusive-screenshots/
In 2018, we shared some details and screenshots from the cancelled HD remakes of the first three classic Mortal Kombat games. And, from the looks of it, Eyeballistic will repitch this project to Warner Bros. Furthermore, the team revealed some brand new screenshots that you can find below.

Monday news, part two:

Babylon's Fall didn't rip off Final Fantasy 14's assets—it was given them
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/babylons-fall-didnt-rip-off-final-fantasy-14s-assetsit-was-given-them/
Babylon's Fall is the next big project from Platinum Games, a live service hack-and-slash RPG that can be played in teams of four, and boasts a gorgeous art style. It's recently been running a closed beta test and, after the embargo dropped, certain players accused it of ripping off some of its in-game outfits from Final Fantasy 14.

Zombie company Atari to devour MobyGames
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/zombie-company-atari-to-devour-mobygames/
Atari announced on November 24 that they have reached a deal to acquire user-driven videogame database MobyGames for $1.5 million.
MobyGames is a singular resource for those interested in gaming history. Users can upload summaries, screenshots, box art, and developer information for anything from upcoming releases to games from the very dawn of the medium into a database which currently stands at 300,000 unique titles. This information is then assessed by volunteer fact checkers—think Wikipedia moderators. Unlike Wikipedia, this user-driven database is for-profit, which has already led to conflicts of interest between users and its owners.

A Marvel MMO is coming from DC Universe Online studio, City of Heroes lead dev
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/a-marvel-mmo-is-coming-from-dc-universe-online-studio-city-of-heroes-lead-dev/
An unannounced MMORPG based on a Marvel IP is in the works at Dimensional Ink, the studio behind DC Universe Online and subsidiary of Daybreak Game Studio. The game's development will be led by Jack Emmert, who designed City of Heroes and who currently leads development on DCUO. The project is a long-term one, so don't expect to hear more until 2023 at the soonest.

Cyberpunk 2077 rated 'very positive' by new user reviews
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/cyberpunk-2077-rated-very-positive-by-new-user-reviews/
Since it went on sale for half-price in the Steam Autumn sale, messy open-world RPG Cyberpunk 2077 has been flooded with positive user reviews. It went from receiving just 78 thumbs-up on November 23, to 2,882 of them on November 24. The day after that 5,589 positive reviews were posted. At the same time, it's shot up the list of global top sellers and at the time of writing has the top spot.

Xbox Halo Infinite players want to opt-out of crossplay to avoid cheaters on PC
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/xbox-halo-infinite-players-want-to-opt-out-of-crossplay-to-avoid-cheaters-on-pc/
With depressing predictability, a free-to-play competitive game comes out and complaints of rampant cheating roll in. In the case of Halo Infinite, which opened its multiplayer beta on November 15, some of those complaints come from players on console asking for the option to disable crossplay to avoid the larger number of cheaters on PC. "Let me turn off cross-play until you guys can get an actual anti-cheat implemented" writes @jcb_response, posting two videos of a player using a wallhack and an aimbot.

Massive WW2 strategy game War in the East 2 hits Steam in December
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/massive-ww2-strategy-game-war-in-the-east-2-hits-steam-in-december/
Gary Grigsby's War in the East 2 will release on Steam on December 9th. Previously exclusive to publisher Slitherine's website store, the monster wargame is what I'd call the most comprehensive simulation of a war front ever made. Simulating in fine detail the conflict between the Soviet Union and the Nazi Third Reich between 1941 and 1945, it's the kind of single game a wargame fan can sink literally thousands of hours into and feel they've barely scratched the surface.

4.1GB of HD models and textures added to Neverwinter Nights Enhanced Edition
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/41gb-of-hd-models-and-textures-added-to-neverwinter-nights-enhanced-edition/
Beamdog's remastered version of Neverwinter Nights was released in 2018, bringing graphical improvements like pixel shaders and post-processing effects to BioWare's other Dungeons & Dragons RPG. (The enhanced edition also restored its multiplayer server list.) Characters still had the same blocky, polygonal heads they had in the 2002 original, however. That's changed with the HD Models & Textures Pack, which unpacks to 4.1GB of better-looking characters, as well as weapons, armor, and shields.

Ghostbusters: The Video Game Remastered won't get multiplayer after all
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/ghostbusters-the-video-game-remastered-wont-get-multiplayer-after-all/
When Saber Interactive remastered Ghostbusters The Video Game, releasing it 10 years after Terminal Reality's 2009 original, the co-op multiplayer wasn't included.
(...)
Now it's seemingly been confirmed as dead in the water. Speaking to MP1st, Saber's chief creative officer Tim Willits said, "This is something the team really wanted to include when working on that remaster a few years ago and had been attempting it, but the state of the original multiplayer code unfortunately just didn't cooperate. We did look into it but ultimately had to focus on recreating the single player experience fans were expecting from us."

Create the mythic history of humanity in this colony builder
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/create-the-mythic-history-of-humanity-in-this-colony-builder/
Upcoming colony sim TFM: The First Men has an intriguing idea: What if you're in charge of the very first people? Starting with the first two people, you'll take charge of building up a base for your people like in other city builders or colony sims, but you'll also send people out into the world as parties to explore on RPG-style adventures.

Enjoy Halo Infinite's Fiesta mode while it lasts, because it'll be gone tomorrow
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/enjoy-halo-infinites-fiesta-mode-while-it-lasts-because-itll-be-gone-tomorrow/
Halo Infinite's first live event, Fractures: Tenrai, is a bust. But the silver lining to a cloud of poorly-considered challenges, cosmetics and progression woes has been the return of Fiesta, a fan-favourite mode that spawns you with two random weapons and a random piece of equipment.
>> In a rare move, this time that tomorrow is actually tomorrow, Tuesday, November 30th.

You still have time to grab some legendary guns and a hunter in Hunt: Showdown's Twitch Drops event
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/you-still-have-time-to-grab-some-legendary-guns-and-a-hunter-in-hunt-showdowns-twitch-drops-event/
With its elegant old-timey setting and heart-rending approach to permadeath, Hunt: Showdown has always felt a bit more refined than your typical battle royale-esque game. That’s reflected in its Legendary Weapon skins, which range from ornately engraved revolvers to rifles adorned with cryptic wood-carvings. You’ll find no neon pink cameo or emoji graffiti here.

New World players despair over the neverending waves of fishing bots
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/new-world-players-despair-over-the-neverending-waves-of-fishing-bots/
Pretty much since launch New World, as with any decent-sized MMO, has been targeted by bots. Initially our mindless friends focused on fishing and ore-gathering, which is still largely the case, though they now seem to be branching out into other careers and, most notably, hitting fairly high levels. Let's put it this way: When you've got a bot at level 30 plus, that is a lot of fishing XP, and suggests how long that bot has been active.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 Ti confirmed to feature Micron’s 21 Gbps GDDR6X memory

https://videocardz.com/newz/nvidia-geforce-rtx-3090-ti-confirmed-to-feature-microns-21-gbps-gddr6x-memory

Minimum performance uplift, maximum wattage

Attention to Detail in VALVE Games (1998-2020)

Quite the interesting video. Some of those will certainly make you go wow

Yea the fight between mini-LEDs and OLEDs are gonna be interesting. I think next year, we gonna see some really good options in the PC monitor space with the upcoming Samsung monitors and the LG 42 inch OLED. Maybe it's about time we get our piece of the pie!

Time for my PC review as it's been about a year since I built my PC from scratch. (K maybe not for all components but you know what I mean)

The goods:

- 5950x has been fap worthy. Because I work in IT, I require a PC that's able to handle a lot of VMs in case I want to experiment at home before deploying certain things at work as well as test labs for cert training. 5950x paired with 32GB of ram has been a god send as I have been able to handle a ton of VMs without any slowdowns.

- 3080 has also been very fap worthy. It's been able to handle any task I throw at it whether it comes to gaming or mining. The fans can get a tad loud at times which can get annoying and there is coil while, especially when you enable Ray Tracing but the performance has been incredible.

- 011 Dynamic XL has been a really good case to work it. It is so versatile even if a tad large. It's hotswappable drive cages have come in handy when I wanted to add in a new hard drive. Cleaning it also has been very easy.

- The software/driver experience has been flawless. When I got Ryzen 1st gen with x370, there were crashes and random slow downs until many BIOS and driver updates later. Ryzen 5000 with the Dark Hero has been a different story. BIOS updates works without any issues, no crashes or bluescreens or slowdowns of any sort. It's been a really good experience.

The bads:

- The AIO that I have been using for a month had one of it's fan die already which is very wtf worthy. Well maybe not die but started making buzzing noises which may as well be dead to me as I like a silent PC. The good thing about the AIO is that the rgb portion is a separate attachment to the fan which you can attach to any fan. So I went ahead and replaced the fans with the Noctuas I had from the old CPU cooler and boom, have both RGBs and fap worthy fans. The pump whine at 100% is also very annoying but luckily with these pumps, the difference between 70% and 100% isn't very noticeable in terms of performance but makes a world of difference when it comes to noise levels.

The uglys:

- RGB. It's not so much the software or the RGB itself that's the hassle, it's the insane amount of nonsense when it comes to the hardware. I got Lian Li SL120 expecting it to be the best way to make it work. I bought 9 of these fan packs ($120 per 3) but wow has it been a pain. See these fans has this nice mechanism where you plug 3 of them them together which then goes out to one cable. But that one cable has a proprietary connector which then splits into two cables and plugs into their proprietary controller which then plugs into a standardized motherboard connector. And the controller itself is so bad. It's cheap and you need quite a lot of force to plug the connectors into it. And good luck pulling out anything once it's in. And on top, my first controller died and because I couldn't get the cables out, I basically had to throw away the controller along with the cables that were plugged into it. Luckily I had 2 other controllers + 6 more cables thanks to buying them in packs. Also you can't just have the controller at any place on the PC, you gotta put it in the middle so the cables from the fans can reach it. It's so annoying and why not make it all standardized in the first place?

- RGB part 2. The AIO RGB is also equally bullshit. You have these RGB headers that are all proprietary but then they give you an adapter so you can connect to a standard motherboard argb port. Again why not make it all standardized in the first place???

- RGB part 3. The white color in the motherboard isn't the same color of white as on the RGB fans. Lian Li has a function where you can have the motherboard control all your RGB so when I tell my motherboard's RGB software to set all my lights to a static white, the shade of white is different on the Lian Li than the rest of my pc. Like really?

Final thoughts:

- Overall I love my computer. It's been fap worthy in almost every way. As a person that wasn't to focused in the RGB world, I learnt that you needed quite a lot of pre-planning to make it work. Although I am getting to the age where I don't really have time to spend on building PCs myself so maybe next time, I will have someone else do all the planning for me.

I'm happy that you're delighted with your computer, Yuri. And your experience with RGB only reinforces my position to stay the hell away from it.

Also, for you and anyone else with GamePass on PC, here's something that you may be interested:

You can secretly play over 20 unlisted games on Xbox Game Pass for PC
https://www.pcgamer.com/uk/you-can-secretly-play-over-20-unlisted-games-on-xbox-game-pass-for-pc/
Xbox Game Pass for PC is an awkward, beautiful beast. It consistently manages to impress me with its ever-growing games line-up, while at the same time baffling me with its obscure user experience.

Take the EA Play integration, for instance, which gives you access to dozens of games from EA's subscription service. Not only can you not search for specific EA games within Xbox Game Pass for PC, but I recently discovered that there are actually over 20 EA Play games not listed at all in the Xbox app that you can play with an Xbox Game Pass PC subscription.

To play one of these games, you need to sign into the EA Play or Origin app, then simply type the game name into the search box and download it (make sure your EA and Xbox accounts are linked).

A few days ago I told you that I could be away for some days during December, and today I got confirmation of it. Everything will be as usual until Friday 10th, but then I'll be gone until the 23rd or 24th.

That, as I said in my other post, puts me out of the Secret Santa thread. I'll check to see if noname or Raven are around and want to take care of it, but there's no guarantee.

If no one else will do it, I volunteer.

Valve is reportedly ditching VR to focus on the Steam Deck
https://www.kitguru.net/gaming/mustafa-mahmoud/valve-is-reportedly-ditching-vr-to-focus-on-the-steam-deck/
According to insider Tyler McVicker (and collated by Reddit user Awkward96), Valve as a company has mostly lost interest in VR. This is said to be due to the fact that Facebook (now Meta) has managed to gain a stranglehold on the market by purchasing many of the biggest VR developers. The Quest 2’s success is undoubtedly another factor – pushing the market into a standalone VR future.

Mirror’s Edge Remastered rumoured for The Game Awards
https://www.kitguru.net/gaming/mustafa-mahmoud/mirrors-edge-remastered-rumoured-for-the-game-awards/
Coming via 4Chan (and as such should be taken with a pinch of salt), a remaster – not remake – of 2008’s Mirror’s Edge is said to be currently in the ending stages of development. The game will reportedly be announced at the upcoming Game Awards – which is set to take place on the 9th of December – and will then be officially released in February 2022.

Regarding those rumors about a Chrono Cross remaster, dataminers have found in the gacha RPG Another Eden files regarding a crossover with Chrono Cross, and a collaboration with Square-Enix for the game was just announced. Live-stream with the announcement will be on the 4th of December and dataminers say the collaboration will go live on the 9th.

Edit:

Ubisoft Connect PC Client was added to Steam default package, suggesting Ubisoft is coming crawling back to Steam.

Edit #2:

Didn't see this posted.

CD Projekt sales up but GOG struggles
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2021-11-29-cd-projekt-sales-up-but-gog-struggles
Another contributing factor to the less flattering bottom line was the performance of the company's digital storefront, GOG.com. Despite the addition during the quarter of older Star Trek games, Myst, and new titles like Psychonauts 2, GOG only saw revenues inch upward 3% to PLN 41.8 million ($10.1 million).

At the same time, GOG posted a segment net loss of PLN 4.75 million ($1.14 million) compared to the 130,000 PLN ($31,000) it realized in the year-ago quarter.

GOG is losing money and refocusing on ‘handpicked selection of games’
https://www.theverge.com/2021/11/29/22808199/cd-projekt-gog-losses-restructuring-earnings-2021
CD Projekt says its GOG games storefront will put more focus on offering “a handpicked selection of games” and transfer some developers to other projects, following ongoing financial losses at the division.